Transcription

1 CHAPTER-III Indian Television: From Edutainment to Entertainment

2 Chapter - 3 Indian Television: From Edutainment to Entertainment Indian television celebrated its 50 th anniversary in These fifty years can be broadly divided into three phases. The first phase was unto 1983 when the medium focused on education and information to farmers and students. Its reach was confined to few pockets of the country. The second phase is the one in which Doordarshan was the only official channel in the country and had limited broadcasting hours. The programmes were still trying to spread education and information though various genres. Whereas the third phase which is the most important phase in the history of Indian television changed the face of the medium as it broke the traditions by bringing in genres that were purely meant for entertainment. This study comes into shape during a period when the third phase is about to complete almost two decades. It is within these two decades the industry of television has gone through drastic changes. This chapter will briefly look at the first two phases and then have a detailed discussion about the third phase. Here I will discuss how soap opera as a genre got introduced into the Indian television and got Indianized and then got established as the most popular genre in the television industry because at present more than onethird of India s billion inhabitants regularly watch Indian television soaps (Munshi 2010: 5). Subsequently I will also examine the different trends within the genre of soap operas on Indian television while dealing with issues like family, gender relations, especially with respect to portrayal of women in them. Along with soap operas, Indian television has also got flooded with reality shows. Like soap operas, reality shows are also American in origin. The Indianized reality 63

3 shows have become very popular, but we are not going to focus on them. The chapter will briefly discuss the genre while talking about the changes on Indian television in the post-liberalization era. 3.1 Introduction of Television in India: The Doordarshan Era Experimentation with television began in India on 15 th of September The scope of its programs (two days a week) was restricted to educational broadcasts for a limited area around New Delhi. Mostly it was looked upon as a tool for disseminating educational messages in Delhi schools and agricultural messages among farmers in the suburbs of Delhi. These two projects were funded by UNESCO 1, as well as the Dutch Electronics Company, Philips 2, and Ford Foundation. The broadcasting time and reach increased gradually and by August 1965 television had become a regular daily service. Initially, the then Prime Minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru, thought television to be too expensive a toy in a country, where more than half the population was living below poverty line, and hence, television s presence in the country was ignored by the state till the beginning of the 1970s. This passivity of the state towards the growth of the network was a subversive (non-)act in an attempt to resist not only the seduction of the image but also electronic colonialism (Ohm 1999: 77-78). But irrespective of everything, the idea of television being an agent of social change gained ground. The debate was resolved by the policy of affirming television as a tool for 1 50 television sets were distributed by UNESCO for tele-clubs, between December 1960 and May 1961, in the rural vicinity of Delhi to disseminate the message of rural development. (Ghosh 2010: 224) 2 On September 1959, Philips India Ltd. donated the equipment of its closed circuit television (21 of them) which it had set up in its stall during an industrial Exhibition in Delhi to the Government of India. (ibid.) 64

4 development in line with the state s ideology of progress and national integration (ibid.). This was explicitly promoted by the then head of the Indian Space Research Programme Vikram Sarabhai (1969): Television is ideal in conveying information and news to the broad masses of the people, particularly to the illiterate section of the population on whom such an audio-visual medium would have a profound impact. The process of education is basically related to the information-dissemination-transfer process (cited in Ohm 1999: 79). Hence the programmes broadcasted at this time were exclusively instructional and educational ones. The government had set up access at community centres around Delhi and at government schools for students. Thus the initial spread of television in India was essentially a community activity. Individual ownership of television therefore only emerged much later (Raghavan 2008: 64). Till 1976 television remained a part of AIR (All India Radio) which was owned by the state. The maintenance of the studios and production of programmes was financially supported by Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. Television service reached other cities only from 1972, beginning with Mumbai. By 1975, seven major cities were covered as television stations and broadcast facilities were progressively set up in those cities. This slow expansion of television in the first two decades was due to the exclusive reliance on a terrestrial mode of transmission which needed huge investments in infrastructure for setting up television stations and transmitters and each could cover only a short specified radius. This meant that transmission centres were mostly located in urban areas leading also to the growth of television as a largely urban phenomenon (Mitra 1993). To overcome this limitation and to find wider rural 65

5 reach, the Congress (Indira Gandhi) government planned to experiment in satellite communications and broadcasting. The Satellite Instructional Television Experiment (SITE) programme, which enabled direct broadcast to six states, was first, introduced between August 1975 and July 1976 when there was a national emergency. It was conducted jointly in collaboration with US space agency NASA. Its main purpose was to disseminate development messages with respect to health, literacy and agriculture and its ultimate aim was generation of national integration. The experiment covering 2400 villages, spanning twenty districts over six states, tested satellite broadcast technology as well as the potential of television in social and educational empowerment (Poduval 1999: 110). This project was declared a massive success and the Indian government got prepared for an enormous investment during 1980s to expand the reach of the television. The period between 1972 and 1982 saw a rapid expansion of television in India. The trend continued in the 1980s under the premiership of Rajiv Gandhi with the motto of one day one transmitter (Ohm 1999: 83). There was a need for large amount of capital for further expansion of Doordarshan which became the main reason for commercialization of programmes. With this came rapid developments in production and transmission technologies, and there was a proliferation of different genres of programmes. It was during this period that there was a rapid growth of indigenous manufacture of receivers/television sets and these were primarily marketed to the urban audience. Hence even though it was repeatedly asserted that TV in India was not to become a 66

6 status symbol or an object of elite consumption but to develop as an instrument of socialisation for a progressive and dynamic society, Dube (1976) concedes that it was catering more to the affluent populations, especially to those who could afford the television sets (cited in Butcher 2003: 57). As a result of this the target audience gradually shifted from rural audience to urban viewers. With the increase in the urban audience base, television got recognized as an excellent medium for advertising by the business houses of the country. This along with the government agency s need of money for its expansion led towards rapid commercialization of television programmes (Mitra 1993). The educational fare of the sixties got increasingly supplemented by a large variety of other programmes such as sports, news, feature film based music programmes, television plays made for Doordarshan and foreign comedies (Mitra 1993: 15-18). But all these did not replace the existing educational programmes for school children and farmers, but supplemented them, and often produced them in more attractive ways. For example, the emergence of programmes such as talk shows, quizzes and dramatizations, that addressed the issues of education and family planning but did so in a way that was more specific to the narrative, representational style of television (ibid.). The programmes were in three languages, English, Hindi and the regional language of the respective states. But at the same time television was treated as a tool to disseminate government propaganda and Doordarshan became firmly established as an institution of the government in power. Government of India indirectly determined the programmes on Doordarshan. Indira Gandhi was quoted making this standpoint very clearly: We are 67

7 proud that it is government organ Primarily, its function is to give the views of the government of India (Cited in Zins 1989: 160, cited in Ohm 1999: 84). Television has thus been a key locus in govermentality, taking this Foucauldian term to mean complex tactics which target populations by deploying the axes of political economy and the apparatuses of social security (Poduval 1999: 109). This led to a serious debate on the issue of state control of one of the most popular media of communication. Two alternative trajectories were suggested to make the medium free of state-control; first, to turn television into a medium of entertainment rather than education and allow commercial sponsorship for various programmes on Doordarshan, and second, to privatize Doordarshan, in order to release it from state control (Mitra 1993: 12). The shift towards the commercialization took place in 1976 with the introduction of advertisements. It started with spot-commercials in 1976 and by 1983 Doordarshan went on to accept sponsored programmes (Poduval 1999). 3.2 Shift from SITE to INSAT and the Growth of Commercial Television The evaluation of Satellite Instructional Television Experiment (SITE) which ended in July 1976 resulted in admissions of having gone wrong and concluded that DD s objectives of reaching and teaching the vast masses of illiterate rural people had remained only a partially fulfilled dream due to its limited reach (Kalathil 1999). To overcome the limitations of SITE, India soon began investing in communication satellites and also developing them domestically. The Indian National Satellite (INSAT) programme emerged from this initiative for incorporating satellite technology into television broadcasting, along with other communication uses. In the year 1982 when the Asian Games were held in Delhi, India s first communication 68

8 satellite INSAT-1A was launched allowing Doordarshan to commence the use of satellite transmission in its broadcast. Colour broadcasting was also introduced for the national coverage of Asian games in Delhi. This satellite facilitated the linking up all Doordarshan Kendras (regional centres), which had until then operated as different and independent regional services, servicing regions of their radius. As a result of which Doordarshan was able to relay National Programme from Delhi for simultaneous broadcast across the country. The national, regional and local transmissions were integrated on a single channel, with the national and regional centres sharing time on it. Following this development in the transmission technology along with the quasicommercialization that had already begun in the late eighties, the educational purpose and programming on Television got increasingly supplemented by the growing presence of non-educational programmes. Television plays and different English and Hindi serials were introduced on Doordarshan. Advertisements were allowed to sponsor these programmes which further opened the doors for commercialization of television. With the introduction of entertainment serials, the state intensified its efforts to deploy Doordarshan in the task of creating a pan-indian national culture (Mankekar 1999: 5-6). They also drew from social learning theory and aimed at influencing viewing subjects to adopt certain pro-development attitudes and behaviours with regard to birth control, literacy and so on (ibid.: 71). In 1983, a team led by the Information and Broadcasting secretary went to Mexico to study the pro-development soap operas of Miguel Sabido and next year Doordarshan commissioned a private producer 69

9 to create a serial that combined an entertaining storyline with developmental messages on family planning, women s upliftment, and so on (Poduval 1999: 111). The serial that was produced was Hum Log (which was highly inspired by a Mexican soap opera) and it was used in propagating the Government s message of family planning (Punwani 1988). Most narratives produced during this period had explicit social message, with themes relating to family planning, national integration, and the status of women woven into the narratives. But at the same time, being the only channel for a growing pan-indian audience, the National Network reflected in many ways the Congress high claim to be all things to all people, which meant it became increasingly a tool to spread Hindi as the national language and Hinduism as the national culture (Ohm 1999: 83, See a detailed discussion on these issues in chapter 6). Gradually with time it became more and more difficult to hide the fact that DD had been torn between two desires between the privileged and the deprived, the urban and the rural, the regional forces and the centre and finally, the global and the local (ibid.) Popular Serials/ Soap Operas in the Pre-liberalization Era As I have stated earlier the concept of development-oriented programmes on Doordarshan was first introduced through the Indian style tele-serial Hum Log (We People) which was a story of a lower-middle-class traditional Hindu joint family based in Delhi, struggling to achieve upward mobility and become middle-class. It started in 1984 and was aired for 17 months and had 156 episodes. This serial became 70

10 a turning point in the very character of television programmes in India. 3 Several other tele-serials were produced after the success of Hum Log. For example, another successful serial Buniyaad followed it which was produced by Ramesh Sippy in As Ramesh Sippy was a Bombay-based Hindi film producer, Harish Khanna (the former Director General of Doordarshan) called it a marriage of convenience between Bombay and Delhi (Mankekar 1999: 73-74). By 1987 almost forty serials were produced with two serials on an average being aired each evening (Raghavan 2008). The other popular serials on Doordarshan during this time were Khandan, Tamas, Rajni, Udaan, Yugantar leaving apart the two epics Ramayan and Mahabharat which were very popular. In the initial days some of these popular serials were loosely labelled as soap operas (Mitra 1993: 84). Even though Hum Log was inspired by a Mexican soap opera and approximated the form of soap opera genre in several respects, it was notably different from the typical soap operas (Das 1995). Similarly when the Ramayana text was adapted for television, a leading national weekly (Sunday) quickly labelled it as the soap opera of the Gods - establishing its inter-textuality with the genre of soap operas as well as underscoring its religious connotation (Mitra 1993: 85). In fact all these were serials which were spread over many episodes but told a complete story. They differed from soaps because there was a closure to their narratives unlike soaps where stories are never finally resolved. As the definition suggests, the genre of soap operas began on Indian television only after the liberalization of Indian economy, i.e. 3 The production and telecast of this development-oriented serial was sponsored by Food Specialties Limited (FSL), which was a subsidiary of the multinational company Nestle. On the one hand, FSL met the production cost of Hum Log, and on the other hand, Hum Log became a vehicle to market the new product Maggi. As Hum Log was a big success, it also made Maggi popular among its viewers, and its sale increased to 5000 tons in 1984 from non-in This example gives a clear picture of how consumerism was closely related to the success of television serials (Mankekar 1999: 81). 71

11 after They began and proliferated on Doordarshan and Private Channels like Zee, between 1992 and Shanti and Swabhimaan were the first two soap operas shown on Doordarshan. We will discuss these in detail in the following sections Presentation of Hindu Mythologies on Indian Television Ramayan and Mahabharat were different from other development oriented entertainment programmes as they were not based on any social issues. They were based on the Hindu mythologies and were targeted at the middle-class Hindu families, which constituted a large section of the viewers of Doordarshan. Justifying the telecast of Ramayan, the Information and Broadcasting secretary S.S. Gill described it as cultural rather than religious containing universalistic values applicable to all (Rajgopal 1994). So the Hindu epics were identified with Indian culture in general. This was the time of growing tension between the Hindu and the Muslim communities, and it made a big contribution in preparing grounds for the Janmabhoomi issue (ibid.). Another indication of the political influence of a religious epic that was mass mediated to millions of people is the young woman who played the part of Sita in Ramayana was elected to parliament on the Bharatiya Janata Party ticket. This is the reason why the broadcast of such religious epics was highly criticized. Arguing in this context, Vilanilam (1996: 79-80) says Fundamentalism (ritual religion) is being revived on television. As long as people are illiterate, culture may be mistaken for fundamentalism He also says that Cultural invasion need not always be from without; it can occur from within. In an attempt to introduce uniformity in culture, the majority community s effort to impose its cultural norms and peculiarities on the rest of the population is also cultural invasion (ibid.: 83). 72

12 But none of these criticisms were able to make a difference in the making and broadcast of such serials. One can still see the reproduction of these Hindu mythologies on the private channels. In fact they have become the inspirations behind the making of many popular soap operas. For example, when asked how she had conceptualized Kahani Ghar Ghar Ki (KGGK), Ekta Kapoor said that she wanted to make a modern Ramayan (Lalwani 2003b). Taking this argument further, Munshi (2010: 11) suggests that the epics function as the principal text of the K soaps, for a few episodes at least, in situations when the central protagonists are fighting the battle of good over evil. This reflects the influence of the Hindu mythologies on other popular genres like soap operas Mapping the Portrayal of Women in the Serials: The 1985 report of the Working Group on the Software for Indian Television, with Dr. P.C. Joshi as chairperson, identified the failure of the developmental mission of DD as located in its inability to productively reach the rural masses, women and children (Kalathil 1999). So the need to rethink DD s investment in women s issues arose out of the understanding that the nation could not progress and socioeconomic development would remain distorted as long as women were left behind as the lesser half of the society (ibid.: 88). The negative stereotyping of women was blamed on the over-dependence of television programmes on commercial cinema. So the Joshi committee recommended a detailed guideline for DD regarding the positive portrayal of women on television. It said: The Government must at the earliest formulate clear-cut guidelines regarding positive portrayal of women on television. This portrayal must take note of women in all facets of their lives: as workers, and significant contributors to family survival and the national economy. Women must not be portrayed in stereotyped images that emphasize passive, submissive qualities and encourage them to play a subordinate secondary role in the family and the society. Both 73

13 men and women should be portrayed in ways that encourage mutual respect and a spirit of give and take between the sexes. In order to promote a positive ideology that is sensitive to women s needs and permeates the total programming and also to have a coordinated, consistent policy it would be necessary for all Doordarshan policy-makers, programming, and production staff to have regular orientation courses that sensitize them to women s issues (Cited in Punwani 1988: 231). Similarly A Vision for Indian Television which was the Report of NAMEDIA 4 (Media Foundation of the Non-Aligned, 1986) outlined the objectives of Television with respect to portrayal of women as follows: The role of women in television programmes needs to be reappraised, male chauvinism eradicated, and women as equals, with an assured, dignified, honoured role in society must be promoted. Two aspects of television programmes for women were stressed. 1. To create among them awareness of their role and responsibility as social beings with a status equal to men. 2. The specific interest of a large majority of women and of their role in the existing social and family structure. (p.29) Deepa Dhanraj pointed out that these recommendations were based on two premises that the integration into the development process will automatically achieve equality for women, and that DD as a government institution is obliged to execute this national objective (Kalathil 1999: 88). 4 NAMEDIA chose the format of five feedback Seminars around the country in Guwahati, Calcutta, Bangalore, Bombay and Ahmedabad to cover regions and available disciplines, cultural and scientific. These seminars would conclude with a national Colloquium in New Delhi The Chief Ministers of every State in the country and the heads of every Union Territory were invited to send their views on television and, if they so wished, representatives to the National Colloquium. (p. 9) It is necessary to emphasise that as a feedback exercise no attempt was made at the Seminar and the National Colloquium to organise or achieve a consensus, nor formally to make a conference statement or pass resolution. (p. 10) 74

14 Whatsoever affirmative actions were taken to implement the guidelines and programmes based on family health, food, nutrition and home management needs, were devised to guide Indian women to adopt modern behaviour and attitude towards life. There was also an increase in the number of women oriented programmes and serials like Udaan, Adhikar, Rajni and many more like them and a few telefilms like Kya Yeh Gustakhi Hai. Most of these women-oriented narratives articulated the notion of women s emancipation in terms of the New Indian woman whose energies were harnessed to the service to nation (as in case of Kalyani and Rajani), or in terms of the upliftment of women by the state (Mankekar 1999: 154). Some of my respondents still remember the central women characters of the popular serials of the time and take inspiration from strong, independent and confident women like Chutki and Kavita. For example, one of my respondents, a middle-aged housewife from U.P. (who has worked as a high school teacher for more than 15 years), still remembers the Chutki, a character in Hum Log (the first tele-serial on Doordarshan). In Hum Log there was a character called Chutki. She was very ambitious but her father never wanted her to study. But she was very intelligent. And when we compare the reel character with her real life then also it was very similar. The girl who played that character was very good at her studies in real life also. I was also in that same age group at that time. So her character was very inspiring for me. Tulsi s character was also good but I do not find her very impressive. This is the reason why even now she loves to watch soap operas on Doordarshan compared to Private channels. At present her favourite character is Anaro (in Anaro on Doordarshan). At present I am watching Anaro on DD-1. The story revolves around a poor woman who works as a maid servant. The story is about her struggle to feed her child and take care of the day-to-day expenses. She is a very strong and confident woman. 75

15 So the intelligent and ambitious girl has preferred to grow into a strong and confident woman who can struggle to earn her own bread and take care of her child rather than turning into a glamorous house-wife who is busy in family politics. A highly qualified 30 year old Bengali house-wife (has done her masters in Political science and M.ed and was working in Kolkata before getting married) also remembers a character on Doordarshan, i.e. Kavita in Udaan. I liked the character Kavita. I was very young at that time and my father was in police. So while watching, my father used to say one day you will also grow up and I want to see you making something good out your life. So I used to get some strange feelings in myself. That serial was really very inspiring. She also liked to watch Jassi because it was something different than these saasbahu serials but later she lost interest in it as they dragged the story unnecessarily (we will discuss this in detail in another section in this chapter). The commonalities between these two women are that they are both educated and were working and will get back to work when things fall back to place and there is little change of taste when it comes to their favourite character. They always loved and still love to watch independent and achieving women and not merely the good housewives. But the textual analyses of these serials suggest that the moral of these stories were like unmarried women had to be protected by their families and in contrast, those who transgressed their assigned place in the patriarchal family were severely punished by exile, profound emotional anguish, or suicide which ultimately reinforced the patriarchal family s authority to control the sexuality of women 76

16 (Mankekar 1999: 118). There are many studies which explored how women are represented on the medium and some of them demanded a change in the representation. For example, Punwani (1988) analysed Hum Log, Khandan, Buniyad, Rajani, Poornima, Chehre, Kala Jal and many others and concluded that the picture of Indian women on television is of a housebound, tradition-bound, passive person. Pointing out the recommendation of the P. C. Joshi committee for a system of regular monitoring of the portrayal of women on television which stated that There should be a weekly programme of viewer s views in which the audience as also critics and commentators from newspapers, women s organizations etc. are called to analyze and evaluate the week s programme. The evaluation must have a specific focus in the way in which women are portrayed. Punwani (1988: 232) said that Doordarshan needs to build up a commitment not only to women, but towards promoting a changing image of Indian society. Nandini Prasad (1994) did the textual analysis of Aaye Begane Deshi: Sasural, Aurat ki Jeevan Yatra 5 (by Meera Deewan), Chhattisgarh Ki Beti, Pachpan Khambhe Lal Deewaren, Bharat Ka Lal, Dayare, Titli, Kya Yeh Gustakhi Hai (during her study 14 serials at prime time were telecast). She concluded that there was hardly ever a portrayal of normal women. Negative, limited images of women, victims of circumstances were shown, and if the women were assertive, they went to the other extreme and were depicted as shrewish, vampish, uncaring and bold jean clad and cigarette smoking (Prasad 1994: 112). Very often, women were represented as creators of social problems yet rarely as creators of solutions of those problems. They 5 A touching commentary on the traditional Indian social system, the film defines the identity of a woman as a total non-entity. (p. 106) 77

17 were projected as lively, yet submissive housewives, sacrificing their love in order to conform to the pressures of society (McMillin 2004: 87). Similarly Mankekar s analysis of mythological dramas and of woman-oriented narratives of late 1980s Doordarshan revealed that women in these programmes were either portrayed as revered and divine beings within the constrains of right-wing Hindu revivalism where their bodies became sites of sexual pleasure. And the progressive and powerful women were limited by their womanhood and hence ultimately could not equal or surpass the status of men (Mankekar 1999). She says, Women-oriented programs reflected the state s need to mobilize women not just toward the twin goals of development and modernization, but also as custodians of the unity of the nation; women thus had to be constituted as loyal and patriotic citizens who would protect the integrity of the nation (ibid.: 107) Jyoti Punwani (1988) makes the following generalizations about the portrayal of women in the soaps shown on Doordarshan. 1. An overwhelming majority of them are home-based, whether married or unmarried. 2. Working women are always shown to be so, through circumstances, not choice, that too, unhappy circumstances. Also rarely are they happy in their jobs. 3. Marriage is seen as natural state for woman, if single, the woman is working towards achieving that state; if widowed/divorced, she is rarely happy. She may be making a success of her life, but underlying that is her sadness at her single and lonely state. 4. In their relationship with men, the ideal women are supportive and dependent; those who are aggressive or independent minded, are not considered desirable role models. 78

18 5. Women who try to break out of their traditional place in society and family, do not meet with happy end. At best, they have to compromise to some extent, but by far the commonest fate reserved for them is failure. (p. 225) Moving ahead Dhanraj (1994) notes that first of all Doordarshan assumed women to be uniform in their needs and desires and defaulted their representation to the middleclass, upper caste, urban Hindu. Secondly, in most serials, domestic labour was framed as an extension of woman s natural mothering role. Third, the single, working woman was portrayed as English speaking and sexually active, which was clearly out of the accepted norm of the docile Hindu housewife. Fourth, even a woman in power was defined by the patriarchal norm that saw it necessary to downplay her sexuality (cited from McMillin 2004: 86). So far we have discussed the various committees and their recommendations regarding the portrayal of women on Doordarshan in the pre-liberalization era and the analysis of various serials by different scholars and their reactions towards the construction of ideal Indian women on Doordarshan. The discussion above addresses the failure of state-controlled television to facilitate women s development in India and provides a feminist critique of the dominant paradigm of development communication that privileges the state and its ideological apparatuses. Now we will move on to the next phase of Indian television which began with the liberalization of the Indian economy and the subsequent entry of foreign players into the Indian media sphere. 3.3 Liberalization of Indian Economy and the invasion from Sky India with its entry to the global market not only allowed its own market to get flooded with imported goods but also its television industry to go through a complete 79

19 transformation. It was under this global influence that Indian television experienced a major shift, both in its content as well as its purpose. Till 1991 the Indian state had a monopolistic control over the medium of television through state controlled Doordarshan. But since then, with liberalization of economy and polity, the Indian media landscape has changed radically. The shift from the state-controlled media where the Doordarshan was the sole player in the field with a total monopoly to the opening of the media to private channels was accompanied by the shift to the market, and global capital spearhead and guided by the state (Chakravarti 2000: 12). The deregulation of the Indian economy impacted the structure, production values, content and viewing context of the television industry. Development of media technology and the establishment of media infrastructure have contributed towards this change. With the increase of television channels and cable networks, this change has become more radical (Brosius and Butcher 1999; Butcher 2003). First of all, as Ninan says the revolution in Indian television has created a climate for greater freedom of information for the vast majority. It has created space on television for all political parties and not just the ruling party, as was the case when Doordarshan had a monopoly (cited in Richstad: 1998: 301). But the educational and informative aspect, which was the initial purpose of television in India, got marginalized as entertainment took its place. Privatization of Indian television replaced the development communication function and gave way to entertainment in order to attract high audience ratings and at the same time promoted consumerism, capitalism, and other western values (Rogers 2000: 71). 80

20 CNN was the first news channel, which made an entry into India via satellite during the Gulf war, i.e. in early After that the Public television broadcasting system of India i.e. Doordarshan was challenged by 40 private channels in the 90 s which included STAR-TV owned by Rupert Murdoch s news Corporation; SONY, owned by SONY Corporation of Japan and ZEE-TV owned by Subhash Chandra from India. Responding to the competition from STAR TV, Doordarshan supplemented its regional-language channels and the national network with five new satellite channels which provided programming similar to STAR TV. STAR had to use Hindi programming in its Zee Channel to capture the Indian audience. This gave rise to an entirely new industry of cable television operators through out the country. The growth was so fast that by the end of 2000, India became World s largest cable and satellite market with 35 million homes and 150 million cable viewers (Singhal & Rogers 2000: 108). In 2001 it reached 41 million (12% increase from the previous year) out of which almost 16 million were in rural areas (Butcher 2003: 66) Increasing Audiences and their Fragmentation Till late 1995, it was only the upper-middle-class and the upper-class viewers who could afford to subscribe to a cable connection. Again this viewership was limited because the programmes on Star TV were in English language and much more westernized than the programmes on Doordarshan and Zee TV. Its audiences were mainly from upper class and upper-middle class and with English education. To overcome this problem, Star TV decided to move towards Indianization of its programmes. It hired Ratikant Basu (the former Doordarshan Director General) as its 81

21 CEO in October 1996 who introduced Star Plus, which was very Indian in its programming pattern (Mankekar 1999:47). Initially it showed programmes which were earlier shown on Doordarshan and were big hits. Such serials include Imtihaan, Chandrakanta and Alif Laila. This new marketing strategy brought Star into direct competition with Zee TV. In order to attract the middle class and lower middle class audience, Star introduced Hindi news and a big bunch of soap operas in its prime-time schedule for its soap opera lovers. This was also the time when Sony entered the market and gained popularity within a short span of time. But with all these developments, the regional locale serials such as Buniyaad, Humlog, Malgudi Days completely disappeared on the national private channels and got replaced by a unified set of protagonists in unified representation of a home which we will discuss in the following section. Now representation of the local is no longer part of the national; instead it is now done by the regional channels of the Doordarshan and a series of private channels operating programmes in regional languages such as Asianet and Sun TV (Chakravarti 2000: 13). This intense growth of transnational television gave rise to concerns regarding process of cultural change in India. Though it opened the magic window to the world, it has since been condemned as an invader and as the harbinger of change that has been described as alien by religious leaders, politicians and social commentators (Butcher 2003: 14). It was said that the transnational television brings in a large number of strangers in the form of performers or characters in the television programmes. Viewers socially interact with these media performers. The world that gets created through mediated communication is a world of intimate strangers (Goonasekera 1998). 82

22 With this development of private channels, the notion of audience as a national public got replaced by audience as market, or rather series of markets made up of isolated individuals. In a similar situation in Europe, Katz argued that such increasing segmentation of audience denies the nation-state a medium to promote social integration and a sense of common purpose (Katz discussed in Webster 2005: 369). Till 1991 every television viewer in India watched the same news and the entertainment programme irrespective of her/his financial status or the location urban /rural. But with privatization, there was a fragmentation of Indian audience. Initially there was a clear divide between the audience in urban setting and rural setting. The urban elite viewers with their high disposable incomes were the main target audience of the private channels as they were desired by the advertisers (Singhal & Rogers 2000: 121), and the audience in the villages and small towns were left with Doordarshan as their only option. But things have changed drastically in past few years and this sort of fragmentation is getting blurred. The opening up of the electronic media to private channels have not only retained the same biases in terms of class, caste, gender and region with their focus on urban India and the celebrated 200 million buying public, but at the same time, have brought in new biases. Now, in villages which continue to be denied the basic necessities of life, it is possible to see satellite TV and Doordarshan. The continuing poverty, illiteracy, inequality and vulnerability of most sections of rural men and women have been completely erased from the screen and from the consciousness of the globalised India (Chakravarti 2000: 17). Bharucha (1994: 108) says the implications of this cultural invasion are enormous not merely because of the grotesque disparity between the consumerist representation of development on television (what is desirable) as 83

23 opposed to the abject economic conditions of its viewers (which determine what is available). There were serious questions regarding the impact of foreign programmes on the country s value system. In order to answer some of these questions, Asian Media Information and Communication Centre (AMIC) funded an exploratory study in 1993 (Joshi 1998). A viewers survey was conducted in two metropolitan cities, of India namely Bombay and Madras. The survey was conducted in February The main purpose of the survey was to find out the viewers opinions regarding Indian and foreign programmes in terms of presentation, content, values and impact (ibid). At the end it was believed that Indian culture and values are strong enough to withstand any cultural invasion (ibid.). It was found that the audience were all aware of harmful effects of foreign programmes, but at the same time majority of them considered that foreign programmes could enrich their knowledge. Most of them did not consider foreign programmes as having bad effects on their way of living. In other words, the audience were not unsuspecting consumer duped by capitalism (Lee 1998: 281). Through a survey it was found that Indian culture-specific films and serials were more favoured than the external culture-specific productions. Hence later on the programmes on the foreign channels were modified or adapted to meet the expectations of the hoped-for audience. The strong role of the television audiences and their values and their preferences for local or transnational productions, had a large say. Parija (1996) also has a similar argument. She says By presenting an alien culture, Swabhimaan helps its viewers to define their own culture, to introspect and understand their own social position better (p.108). Her finding contradicts the 84

24 assumption that the non-indian culture is actually damaging Indian culture. Rather it shows that the popularity of the Indian culture grows stronger with new challenges Introduction of Satellite Channels and the emergence of Reality Shows in India Reality shows in India date back to the Channel V s talent hunt for making of a musical band. A band of girls called Viva emerged from this show. It enjoyed shortlived popularity but marked the beginning of reality shows in India. Superstar Amitabh Bachchan s Kaun Banega Crorepati, which was the Indian version of Who wants to be a Millionaire, was a major hit with the audience in India. What followed next was a flood of reality shows. Many of them are adaptations of the pre-existing western versions of reality shows like Celeb-Reality, Prank-Reality, Game Shows, Talent Hunts, Job-hunts, Makeovers, Dating-Shows, Social Experiments, Adventure/Fear based shows. Reality shows in India were welcomed by many of the audience who were tired of the Ekta Kapoor's saas-bahu soap operas that were (and some of them still are) predominant on Indian television. However at present these shows are enjoying tremendous popularity. The most popular reality shows on Indian television now are MTV Bakra, Kaun Banega Crorepati, Indian Idol, Sa Re Ga Ma Pa, Big Boss, The Great Indian Laughter Challenge, Nach Baliye, Jhalak Dikhlaja etc. The best thing about a reality show is that they are interactive as the viewers decide the winner through voting. It is all about people's participation, journey to fame and a lot of passion and emotion. Audience see the dreams of millions of Indians come true 85

25 through these shows. They relate to the characters that appear on the shows, and this makes the shows more meaningful than other genres. Some reality shows provide artists a good platform to get noticed, some shows help people win money and fame but almost all of them keep the audience hooked to the channel. Reality shows are criticized with allegations that these shows are trading on human emotions for money. There are controversies about these reality shows being 'planned and scripted' or the voting lines being a hoax. There are also controversial and confessional shows like Sach Ka Samna. But still reality shows are claimed to be the place where reality meets fiction Introduction of Satellite Channels, the Soap Operas and the Construction of Womanhood: As we have discussed earlier the case of Doordarshan, there were serialized programmes which were loosely labelled as soap operas. The first set of Westernstyle soap operas to be telecast on Indian television were the dubbed versions of American soaps Santa Barbara and The Bold and the Beautiful (the popular soaps from US) on Star TV. Their viewership was limited as they were in English and the soaps failed to hold the attention of the upper class viewers for long. Soon after this Zee TV came with Hindi soaps like Tara, Parampara, Amaanat, Ashirwaad etc. which were also popular but their popularity was also limited due to the limited accessibility of the satellite channels. Its reach was confined to urban viewers only. Shanti and Swabhimaan were the first set of Hindi soaps, which came on Doordarshan. These were daytime soaps (unlike the primetime soaps on Zee) and were targeted at women who stayed at home during daytime (Cantor and Pingree 86

26 1983). Both the soaps were very successful. A study done by Sudesna Parija (1996) on Swabhimaan shows that it also attracted the attention of working women. They did not mind running to the nearest friend s house during office hour, just to check out what was happening with the characters Swetlana and Rishab Malhotra. Part of the success of these two soaps was also due to the larger reach of the state network compared to the private channels till late 90s 6. Following this there was a spurt in the number of soap operas on Indian television especially on the private channels and they dealt with various issues. For instance, serials like Saans and Kora Kaagaz depicted women coming into their own, breaking barriers of convention. There were others, which revolved around interpersonal relationships, against the backdrop of joint families e.g. Yeh hai Mere Apne, Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu thi, Mehendi Tere Naam Ki, Babul ki Duyain Le Jaa, Ghar Ek Mandir among others Tu Tu Main Main was a satire on the much-debated mother-inlaw vs. daughter-in-law relationship. Serials like Amanat and some of the older ones like Campus, Banegi Apni Baat, Challenge and Alp Viram dealt with the sufferings and obstacles faced by youngsters in friendship, courtship, in marriage and out of it, with slight emphasis on physical relationships and passions. Unlike the earlier generation of serials which had themes such as the depiction of anticolonial struggles, the uplift of women, the social reformist efforts of patriotic men and women, and the portrayal of military heroes, most of these new serials (e.g. Tara, Andaaz, Parampara, Swabhimaan) were about adultery, the trials of single women, 6 A 1993 report said the state network reached 83.6 per cent of the population, while STAR was listed at about 15 per cent, but mostly in the more advertiser friendly urban areas (Richstad 1998: 301). 87

27 corporate wars and so on (Mankekar 1999: 356). Earlier soaps on DD tended to comply with the code of popular Indian cinema where negative women, clearly polarized against the heroines. With the likes of Santa Barbara and Dynasty and their Indian counterparts, the line between the good and evil has become blurred. We see it in the next chapter that women admit to secretly admiring bad women, who are seen as strong, as opposed to good women. The Star channel also quickly gave up with the dubbed American soaps and switched over to home made Hindi programmes on its Star Plus channel. Then came soap operas produced by Ekta Kapoor s Balaji Telefilms which are responsible for changing the face of Indian television. Ekta Kapoor who could detect the pulse of the Indian audience came up with some very successful soap operas like KSBKBT, KGGK, and KZK. These soaps ran for almost a decade. There were many others which ran for years like Kkusum, Koshish Ek Asha, Kahin To Hoga., Kabhi Sautan Kabhi Saheli. Invariably all her soaps revolve around the themes of family problems, love, marriage, divorce and re-marriage. They are all women centric. Her famous heroines like Tulsi, Parvati and Kusum are portrayed as representatives of ideal Indian bahus. They are always busy in kitchen and in solving problems created by some other family member, who again is almost always a woman (e.g. Pallavi, Kamolika and the list goes on). What Ekta Kapoor succeeded in doing was bringing the independent and outgoing women like Shanti and Swetlana back into the fold of joint family. They are the ideal daughters-in-law and devoted wives. Looking at the enthusiastic audience reception of serials presenting women as happily domesticated the political scientist Neera Chandoke noted that the prime-time soap operas had undone the efforts of the feminist movement (Chandoke 2001). So since then Ekta 88

28 Kapoor has been challenged time and again but still she holds a strong position in the production of soap operas for Indian television. For example, to compete and challenge the dominance of the K-soaps, Sony channel came up a new wave of soaps like Jassi Jaisi Koi Nahi (JJKN) in 2003 (which was based on a Colombian TV presentation, Yo Soy Betty La Fea) and Astitwa whereas most of the K-bannered soaps are based on the saas- bahu saga and revolve around the kitchen politics, here the characters like Jassi and Simran were shown as women with talent who climbed the ladder of success through hard work and honesty. They were very traditional in their values and deeply attached to their families but at the same time they wanted to have their independent identity especially as professionally competent women. So it appeared like the right time to liberate women from the patriarchal social structure and give them a chance to achieve the highest goals in their life. Jassi became a favourite of those viewers who were sick of watching the ideal bahus everyday and were waiting for change. They wanted to see a successful professional Indian woman on the screen and watched JJKN for a change. Most of the middleclass Indian parents, wishing their daughters to become economically independent with a successful professional career, saw Jassi as a role model for their daughters. Many young women also saw Jassi as their role model. But it did not last long The Jassi Mania did not last long but Simran still a Favourite Jassi Jaisi Koi Nahi (JJKN) started at the time when the TRPs of the saas-bahu soaps were very high. Some liked it but some were critical about these soaps. JJKN claimed 89

29 to be different than the saas-bahu soaps and was a hot favourite of many in the first few months. In that soap Jassi had an ugly look and audience waited to see her turning into a beautiful woman but after that it lost its charm. Though Jassi proved her talent time and again, she fell short of confidence. She was well aware of the fact that it was her looks or appearance which was her only draw back but she did not do anything to make herself more presentable. It looked as if her mother and grandmother had a better dressing sense than her. Everybody may not prefer to look glamorous but a line can be drawn between being glamorous and being presentable. Let us see the response of some Jassi fans who turned away from it after the make-over. A middle-aged house-wife (Kannadiga from Gulbarga) likes both Tulsi and Jassi for different reasons and makes a comparison between the saas-bahu soaps and Jassi. I like Tulsi a lot because she keeps the whole family together. She also tries to solve problems in the family and helps everyone in the family in maintaining a bond. Such people also exist in our society though their percentage is very low. I liked Jassi a lot because that character was very different and very realistic. That serial was much different from these saas-bahu serials day-to-day fights. In it the character Jassi is an ordinary girl who has the courage to stand on her own feet and make such huge achievements in her life. In it we saw how an ordinary girl becomes a star because of her hard work and self-confidence, which is also possible in reality in any ordinary middle class girl s life. I could relate to the story as I do have a daughter and I would like to see my daughter being successful in her life. So all I can say is though these saas-bahu serials show some reality they exaggerate things a lot, whereas a serial like Jassi is more close to reality and can be much more inspiring for the young audience. One can not deny that JJKN gave some space to women in the so called public realm of man. For the first time in the history of Indian soap operas, a nonglamorous woman was shown as possessing enormous potential to handle any problem in her professional life. It showed that a woman can maintain a proper balance between her personal life and career. But at the same time it did not challenge 90

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